After keeping its state unit on edge for days, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Tuesday officially announced its first list of 17 legislators who will be inducted into the B.S.Yedyurappa cabinet.

Rewarding the dominant Lingayat community for backing the party in the assembly as well as the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP has included eight people from this caste grouping (including Yedyurappa). Laxman Sangappa Savadi, Jagadish Shettar, V.Somanna, Basavaraj Bommai, J.C.Madhuswamy, C.C.Patil and Shashikala Annasaheb Jolle hail from the Lingayat community, believed to be the single largest in the state.

Shettar is taking up a cabinet minister’s role despite having served as chief minister of the state from July 2012 till May 2013.

The BJP has also included three Vokkaligas in C.N Ashwath Narayan, C.T.Ravi and R.Ashok to help the party make inroads into south Karnataka, where it has little or no presence. The Vokkaligas have, in recent times, consolidated support for former prime minister the H.D.Deve Gowda-led Janata Dal (Secular) or JD(S) and the BJP has been trying to break this dominance.

The party is rewarding Ashwath Narayan and Laxman Savadhi for their alleged role in shielding rebels with whose help the BJP was able to topple the H.D.Kumaraswamy led Congress-JD(S) coalition government.